Up 146% Since IPO, Can Alteryx Keep Rising?

If you start your company outside of Silicon Valley, you may get more time to achieve an initial public offering. What's more, the leadership style that gets you there can keep growth going long after the funding event.

That's the story behind Irvine, Calif.-based Alteryx. Since its March 24, 2017 IPO, shares in this analytics software as a service (SaaS) provider have soared 146% to a market capitalization of almost $2.3 billion. But on March 13, its shares shed over 5% of their value. Will Alteryx stock resume its rise?

Alteryx is growing fast while losing money—but it has turned cash flow positive recently. Since 2014, revenues have risen at a 51.4% annual rate to about $132 million in 2017 -- while posting a $19.5 million net loss. During that time, the company has gone from negative free cash flow of $4 million to positive free cash flow of $15.3 million, according to Morningstar.

Alteryx's most recent results, for the fourth quarter of 2017, were strong with a boost in sales and higher GAAP gross margins. According to Motley Fool, revenue soared 55% and its customer count rose 46% to 3,392 in the quarter.

While the company is unprofitable, its GAAP gross profit of $32.3 million represented a gross margin of 84%, up one percentage point since the year before.

For the first quarter of 2018, management expects sales to be in the range of $39 million to $40 million and a non-GAAP net loss of $4 million, at the midpoint. For 2018, Alteryx expects revenues to rise between 33% and 36% to a range from $176 million to $179 million, according to Motley Fool.

CEO Dean Stoecker, said, "Demand for our complete end-to-end analytics platform for the enterprise increased, driven by our land and expand strategy. We added a meaningful number of net new customers and continue to have a very strong dollar-based net revenue retention rate."